


What's In A Name?

by agaytoremembr



Series: sterling!verse [6]
Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: M/M, and no one can change my mind, diego is dumb around pretty men, he helps them solve cases and they only arrest him sometimes when they have to, he's also friends with every detective and half the uniformed officers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-28
Updated: 2019-04-28
Packaged: 2020-02-08 13:49:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,824
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18624520
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/agaytoremembr/pseuds/agaytoremembr
Summary: Diego gets arrested for the first time since he was a suspect in Patch's death.This is part of a 'verse, but it can be read as a stand alone!





	What's In A Name?

Diego hadn’t been arrested since he was a suspect in Patch’s death. After everything had calmed down, he had taken a six month leave of absence from doing his vigilante thing, to grieve and to heal, and also because Allison threatened him six ways to Sunday if he dared go back out on the street before dealing with some of his issues. And even after that, he had managed to evade the actual police for another four months.

 

Pressed up against a cop car as a uni frisked him, Diego was beginning to regret the time away. This was a new officer, who was treating him like a _criminal_. Something that hadn’t happened to Diego in years, discounting the time his friends believed he had murdered his ex-girlfriend.

 

Thankfully, he heard a familiar voice. “Diego Hargreeves, as I live and breathe. Is that really you?”

 

Diego craned his neck and grinned. “Swifty, how you _still_ manage to sound like my abuela after ten years on the force is a goddamned mystery.”

 

“You don’t even have an abuela.” Detective Taylor Burke threw his head back and laughed. “It’s good to see ya, Hargreeves.” He nodded at the officer who had paused in frisking Diego. “Richards, I’ll take it from here. Hargreeves is an old friend of the precinct.”

 

The uni scampered off, and Burke took his place, giving Diego a half-hearted pat down. “Why don’t you just make this easier on all of us and tell me where everything’s at?”

 

Diego rolled his eyes. “Typical Burke, looking for the easy way out,” he grumbled, a grin tugging at the corners of his mouth. He had attended the academy with Burke, and even after getting thrown out, he had retained his friendship. He was a funny guy, a good cop, and a hell of a lot of fun to poke fun at.

 

“Typical Hargreeves, getting caught at a homicide scene with weapons,” Burke fired back, nudging Diego in the small of the back, and - yeah, okay, Diego had to give him that one.

 

Diego rolled his eyes and listed off his weapons: throwing knives and stars in his breast pockets and the pouch of his vest, a pistol in a thigh holster, and a wicked hunting knife strapped to his calf.

 

Once Diego was thoroughly de-armed and feeling more naked than if his clothes had suddenly disappeared, Burke whistled low through his teeth. “You sure picked a hell of a crime scene to do your reappearing act at. These are some grisly murders.” He put a hand on Diego’s shoulder to pull him away from the car, giving him a significant look. “I’m gonna have to hold you for the night, for formality’s sake, until we can get you cleared officially.

 

“But,” Burke said with a slight smirk, “if I hang out by holding and study the evidence… there’s nothing stopping you from reading over my shoulder, or me from bouncing ideas off a friend.”

Diego snorted, leaning back against the car. “Gonna have to cuff me?”

 

Burke smirked. “You know it, buddy.”

 

Diego sighed good-naturedly, holding out his hands for the inevitable. He had been through that same song and dance routine too many times for it to still be daunting. “I guess I’ll cooperate, then. Since I _know_ you wouldn’t be able to catch me if I tried, and what kind of friend would I be then?”

 

“You’re awful confident for someone who’s been arrested twenty times in the past year alone,” Burke reminded him, snapping the cuffs around his wrists. They generally cuffed people from behind, but it was _Diego_ , and Burke only went through the motions with him.

 

“Aw, c’mon, Swifty. How many cases have I helped you guys solve in that past year?” Diego raised a brow and smirked, fiddling with the chain connecting the cuffs while Burke opened the door and gave Diego a near-playful shove into the backseat.

 

Burke ignored Diego’s question. “It’s been a damn decade, Hargreeves. You ever gonna let that nickname go?”

 

“You know you love it,” Diego said with a grin, and Burke just rolled his eyes and slammed the door shut.

 

So maybe Burke _didn’t_ love his nickname, but names like that stuck. Burke earned his in the academy, before Diego had gotten himself thrown out. They were all competing at an obstacle course, when one of their instructors had made the comment that Burke was ‘quite swift.’ It really wasn’t much of a clever nickname, but Taylor Swift had become popular around that same time, and that was that. Burke had been Taylor Swift, T-Swift, or Swifty from then on.

 

Burke slid into the driver’s seat, turning the key in the ignition. He glanced back at Diego through the partition. “We haven’t seen you in a while, man. Almost thought you’d given up on all this.”

 

Diego shrugged, flashing a melancholy smile. “Nah. Just took some time, you know, after…” He let the sentence drift, but they both knew what he was referring to: Eudora Patch. The thought of her didn’t choke Diego up anymore, and part of him hated that, the moving on. The other part, though, was glad. “Met someone, though, who makes a real difference.”

 

Burke smiled, glancing at Diego through the rearview mirror. “That’s great, Diego,” he said warmly. “Patch would be happy for you.” He pulled out onto the road. “So, what’s her name?”

 

Diego was reminded of when he asked Klaus that exact question, and he snorted at the ridiculousness of it all. “ _His_ name is Sterling.”

 

Burke’s eyebrows rose, but other than that, he showed no signs of caring about the gender of Diego’s new partner. “Oh yeah?” At Diego’s nod, Burke grinned. “How long you been dating this guy?”

 

Diego shrugged. “Like… Four months, I think?”

 

“So, what’s loverboy’s last name?”

 

Diego rolled his eyes. “Why do you want to know?”

 

“For the background search, _obviously_ ,” Burke said casually, catching Diego’s disbelieving eyes in the mirror and smirking. “You know Patch would have done it, so come on, out with it.”

 

Diego scowled, his cheeks flushing with color. He stayed resolutely silent.

 

Burke’s eyes flickered from the rearview mirror and the road, and his eyes widened. “Holy shit, you don’t even know it, do you? You been datin’ this guy for four months, and you don’t even know his last name!”

 

Diego’s face went beet red. “It’s not my fault I go stupid whenever he looks at me!” The words were out of his mouth before he could stop them. He sighed, figuring he was already this deep in. “I keep forgetting to ask.”

 

Burke snorted. “Sure. _Forgetting_. More like getting distracted and falling into bed.”

 

“Look, dude,” Diego said with a smirk, “if you were dating a hot ass firefighter who fell into bed with you whenever you wanted, you’d forget to ask shit, too.”

 

Burke choked on his laughter. “I’m not sure firefighter is my type, but I get what you’re sayi-” he cut himself off, his eyes widening, a peculiar expression on his face. “Wait, wait, wait, are you dating _Jesse fucking Sterling_?”

 

Diego frowned. “Uh… who?” Who the fuck was Jesse Sterling?

 

“Hold on,” Burke muttered, his brow wrinkling as he pulled off on the side of the road.

 

“Are you… Are you supposed to do that?” This was the weirdest ride to the station that Diego had ever had.

 

Burke rolled his eyes. “Probably not, but who cares.” He waved his hand vaguely, grabbing his phone and prodded the screen a few times, bringing up a Twitter profile. Diego watched curiously, as Burke clicked the profile picture and shoved his phone against the partition. “Is this your boyfriend?”

 

Diego’s breath caught, like it always did when he looked at his boyfriend. The Twitter picture was nothing special, just a run of the mill selfie where Sterling was concerned, but it still made his heart pound. “Yeah, that’s him.”

 

_Wait, did that mean…_

 

Burke cackled. “I can’t believe you’re dating Jesse Sterling. I go out with him and his squad every Friday night!”

 

 _… he hadn’t even know his boyfriend’s first fucking_ name _?!_

 

\---

 

The night in holding had gone by fast, with much ridicule from Burke and the rest of Diego’s friends in the precinct, and a little work done on the homicide. With a half-hearted plea for him to stay out of trouble, Diego had been set free, and the first thing he did was hail a cab to the fire station where he knew Sterling was currently working a double.

 

Most of his boyfriend’s coworkers knew him by then, so seeing him march into the building wasn’t much of a shock as it was intriguing. And what seemed to really amuse them was the deep scowl on his face.

 

“Where ya goin’, Hargreeves?” One of the rookies- _Thomsen_ , Diego thought, it was Thomsen- asked with a grin. “Your boyfriend is napping in the bunkroom.”

 

Diego nodded tightly, glancing around, not exactly sure where that was but too stubborn to ask.

 

Thomsen rolled his eyes and pointed. “In there.”

 

Diego took off in that direction, and Thomsen hollered cheekily after him. “And no hanky-panky in there!”

 

Diego yanked open the door, switching on the light, not particularly caring if he woke Sterling. It was his plan, anyway, because he _needed_ to yell at him.

 

His anger nearly melted away when he saw Sterling, tangled in the sheets, blinking up at him blearily. “Di?” He mumbled, rubbing his eyes and frowning. “Wha’ ya doin’ here?”

 

Diego’s resolve was crumbling. “Is your name Jesse Sterling?” he demanded, before he had nothing left and he fell into Sterling’s (the station’s? It really didn’t matter) bed.

 

“What?” Sterling made a face, and groaned. “Yeah? That’s my name. Why?”

 

“Were you ever going to tell me Sterling isn’t your real first name?” Diego snapped, his embarrassment and irritation blooming in his chest again at the affirmative. “Or was I supposed to find it out when I got arrested?”

 

Sterling’s pale cheeks flushed pink, and he gave Diego a lazy grin. “Well… You never asked?”

 

Diego grabbed a pillow off a bunk and threw it at his boyfriend’s stupid, adorable face. “Asshole.”

 

Sterling grinned. “You like it.”

 

Diego couldn’t really argue that, nor was he arguing when Sterling reached forward, his arm snaking around Diego’s hips and pulling him close. His bare chest was pressed against Diego, and suddenly it was a little hard to breathe. He relaxed into the touch, nudging Sterling back a bit so he could climb on top of him, straddling his waist. “You’re evil,” he mumbled, pressing his lips against Sterling’s. “Using my idiot brain against me.”

 

Sterling laughed, and Diego busied himself with pressing lazy kisses against his throat, without any real intention. Mostly just an excuse to kiss him. They enjoyed the comfortable silence for maybe ten minutes before Sterling seemed to register their entire conversation.

  
“Wait, you got _arrested_?!”

**Author's Note:**

> comments give me life, let me know what you think!!


End file.
